Here’s a review of the Allah Made Me Funny movie by Irfan Rydhan. Apologies for posting this a bit late!
“Allah Made Me Funny – The Movie” is a comedy concert film featuring Muslim American comics: Azhar Usman, Preacher Moss and Mohammed Amer. Just like the comedy tour of the same name, “Allah Made Me Funny” the movie features jokes about being Muslim in America, cultural and ethnic diversity of the Muslim community and standard political jokes which anyone can enjoy.
Since I have been to several of the comedy events featuring two of these Muslim comics over the years, I did not see much new material from either Azhar Usman or Preacher Moss, but I still enjoyed their performances. I had never heard a set from Mohammed (aka “Mo”) Amer before, so I actually enjoyed his stand up the most. Since Azhar is a desi (Indo-Pakistani) and Preacher Moss is African-American, it was smart for them to add an Arab American to their comedy troupe. He definitely brings some freshness to their tour – since earlier they had another African American (Nasir) who was funny, but not much different from Preacher Moss – who discusses the standard Black (Indigenous) Muslim experiences with that of the Desi (Immigrant) Muslims which Azhar covers.
In terms of the movie – I did like the fact that they showed the 3 comics with their families and also when they are at home trying to come up with new material, but I thought they could have done a lot more with having the 3 comics interacting and meeting people on the street. They only had a little bit of that, which was very funny, but instead of doing more of “street interactions” the director instead spent more time in between the stand-up with the comics sitting at home by themselves, which kind of dragged too slowly and interrupted the flow of the film.
I did like the soundtrack of the film which featured local Muslim artists, including Tyson from Remarkable Current here in the Bay Area. It was also good to see local Bay Area Muslims in the audience as well as interviewed in the film during the breaks between the stand-up scenes.
Overall I thought the movie was pretty good and people should definitely go out and support it – since these three guys are doing a lot to help educate and eradicate stereotypes of Islam and Muslims, through one of the most difficult, yet effective methods: Comedy!
Irfan Rydhan
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